The Task Force Predicts The Spike Of COVID-19 To Begin Falling At The Earliest In Early August

Spokesperson for the COVID-19 Task Force Wiku Adisasmito/IST

JAKARTA - Spokesperson for the COVID-19 Task Force, Wiku Adisasmito, predicts that the surge in COVID-19 cases will begin to decline in the next three weeks or early August 2021.

This, said Wiku, can be seen from the comparison of the experience of the first spike in COVID-19 that occurred in early 2021. Then, it was accompanied by the implementation of Emergency Community Activity Restrictions (PPKM).

"Reflecting on the first spike, the fastest decline can only be seen in the next 3 weeks", Wiku said in a virtual press conference, Thursday, July 15.

Wiku explained, in the first spike in cases starting from November 2020 and reaching a peak in January 2021, it took thirteen weeks to reach the peak of cases before cases slowly began to show a decline.

Prior to the increase, the policy implemented was the DKI Jakarta Strict Large-scale Social Restrictions (PSBB) for 4 weeks, but it was relaxed to become a transitional PSBB for 13 weeks until cases finally jumped.

"During this period, cases increased quite sharply because it coincided with the long Christmas holidays and the 2021 new year", he said.

Then there is the mobility restriction intervention, namely the Java-Bali PPKM which was taken after the increase in cases had lasted for 10 weeks.

The impact of this policy intervention can be seen in the lapse of three weeks in which cases can finally drop and the decline lasts up to 1 week. Wiku predicts that the case decline period in this second spike will not be much different.

"With the spike in cases starting to enter the ninth week, as well as policy intervention (Emergency PPKM) which is earlier in the eighth week, the decline in cases is the fastest in the next three weeks", he said.

Wiku said, in the implementation of the Emergency PPKM in the past week, there has been a decline in the level of community mobility. He hopes that this will also reduce the number of transmission of COVID-19 cases.

"Yesterday, the results began to show, there was a decrease in mobility to work, public places, tours, and stations, but this decline in mobility was not enough to reduce the number of cases, considering that over the last few days cases continued to increase, even reaching more than 50 thousand cases per day", he concluded.